West Africa expects new regional airline in 2007
Tunis, Tunisia, 06/05 - The new West African airline company, whose creation was announced in Dakar in 2005 will be operational in 2007, according to Gervais Djondo, chairman of the board of directors of SPCAR (society for the Promotion of a regional air transport company).
SPCAR, which is responsible for setting up the company, has started working to make this ambitious project a reality. The aim is not only to fill the vacuum left by Air Afrique`s disintegration, but essentially also to compensate for the dearth in air traffic between the various regions of the continent.
This initiative, launched with the strong support of the ECOWAS investment and development bank and other financial institutions (as BCEAO and WADB), involves partners including the Association of SADC Chambers of Commerce and Industry (ASSCI) and does not exclude the participation of other companies operating in Africa.
“With the support of the African Airlines Associations (AFRAA), we were able to build fruitful relations with the major African air companies and several presidents of companies have vowed to offer their assistance whenever necessary,” Djondo told PANA here in an interview.
While insisting on the creation of regional companies and the grouping of small African air carriers, the Tunis meeting on the African air transport sector paved the way for Air Afrique` successor.
“The assistance of African States is indispensable to us. We cannot realise our ambition if we lack political support,” the chairman of SPCAR`s board said, as he expressed awareness about difficulties to penetrate the African air market, where liberalisation still lags.
Though the Yamoussoukro Decision was adopted in 2000 by the heads of States to liberalise the African sky, it continues to encounter obstacles despite several appeals by AFRAA to States to ensure effective implementation of that their commitment.
A decisive step was later made in Tunis, following the intervention of Alpha Oumar Konare, Chairperson of the African Union Commission, insisted on the necessity to make an assessment in every country in order to identify the various factors hindering implementation of the decision.
“The Yamoussoukro Decision is a positive development. It constitutes an opportunity for integration to facilitate the free movement of peoples and commodities,” Djondo stressed in support of Konare`s suggestion that “every single party transcends its national egoistic interests”.
The Yamoussoukro Decision does not seem to be in the interest of foreign air companies, eager to retain their quasi-monopoly on the Africa aviation market, of which they control 75%, the rest being left to African operators.
The implementation of the Yamoussoukro Decision as well as incentives for the creation of regional groups of African operators appear as decisive factors when it comes to the development of a continental network by African operators, whose share in the market has propescts for growth.
To attain this result, intensive campaigns have been launched by the African Airlines Associations (AFRAA) among its members in order to invite them to pursue collective action in their discussions aiming at the adoption of air agreements with third party operators.
“The domination of the African sky by foreign carriers has worsened after the air transportation agreements signed at the level of the European Union,” observed Christian Folly-Kossi, AFRAA secretary general.
He believes “the continental market should be controlled by African air companies”.
The campaign yielded positive results, as the Tunis plan of action acknowledges the necessity “to negotiate with the European Union transitional measures relating to the implementation of the community clause,” before the end of the current year.
A negotiation strategy reinforcing the African policy in the field of aviation and relating to air agreements with third parties would allow the adoption, in 2008, of directives for negotiations between African and third party States.
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